


c𝕪bor𝕘⼕■

by sonshineandshowers



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Cybernetics, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Health Issues, Sci-Fi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:07:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23932795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonshineandshowers/pseuds/sonshineandshowers
Summary: Think-e designer positive thinking — the latest advance in psychiatry. Malcolm's new way of getting daily affirmations. Or something like that...
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15





	c𝕪bor𝕘⼕■

Malcolm peeled back the pale skin at his collarbone and slipped in his latest microSD card update. _I am willing to let go and trust myself. I am willing to let go and trust myself._ He thwacked his forehead and the recurrent default thought disappeared, replaced with the new day’s offering. _I design my own reality. I design my own reality. I design my own reality._

It was true. He selected a general theme of what he needed to accomplish for the day, and a talk track of empowering words was uploaded to his brain.

Designer positive thinking — the latest advance in psychiatry. A must have for someone like him.

What did _like him_ even mean?

And why had he let his mother talk him into seeing a new doctor?

_Because your sister killed someone in front of you, your newfound girlfriend was murdered, your might-as-well-be father spent a long time recovering from a stab wound, and your mother had to replace multiple rugs and furnishings after a blood bath. Oh, and your serial killer father still has you on mental speed dial._

“Oh?” Malcolm said aloud.

_Sometimes you require thinking time._

“Really?” he wasn't amused.

_I design my own reality. I design my own reality. I design my own reality._

Fucking hell. He’d go design it at the precinct.

* * *

“Does Bright look extra…Bright to you?” JT asked Dani.

“Maybe something’s a little messed up with his programming?” Dani returned.

“It’s not nice to talk about me when I can hear you,” Malcolm interrupted, addressing both of them over JT’s cube wall.

_I design my own reality. I design my own reality. I design my own reality._

Malcolm’s head twitched and his hand trembled.

“You good?” Dani questioned, her doubt apparent in her widening eyes.

Malcolm shrugged. “A little off.”

“Let me see that chip — I think it’s broken,” JT teased, reaching over the wall.

Malcolm chuckled and shooed his hand away. “That, we can agree on.”

“Hey, bossman wants you in his office,” JT relayed.

“Thanks.” Malcolm patted the top of JT’s cube and continued on to Gil’s.

* * *

Gil was sitting at his desk fixing his sweater collar when Malcolm walked in. “How’s the pain?” Malcolm asked.

“'Pain is an illusion', or so it tells me a hundred times an hour,” Gil shared.

“I design my own reality,” Malcolm returned the version in his head.

“I liked ‘I am magic’ better.”

“Certainly led to some interesting…theories.” Malcolm tipped his head back and forth remembering them.

“That’s what we’re calling _crazy ass shit_ now?” Gil raised his eyebrows, shook his head, and took a sip of coffee.

Malcolm shrugged.

Gil’s brow twitched. “I wish your mother would have left this alone. I was fine without a voice in my head.”

“You couldn’t walk,” Malcolm reminded.

“Yeah, yeah, but I had silence!”

_I design my own reality. I design my own reality. I design my own reality._

Malcolm’s hand shook and he pressed it to his temple as if he would be able to squeeze the voice out of his head.

“Why don’t you just take it out, kid?” Gil suggested.

“I don’t know the alternative’s any better. 'I am willing to let go and trust myself' reminds me of all the days I’ve been…noncompliant.” The fancy word the fancy new doctor used when he didn’t follow through on his medication regimen — card included.

“I don’t have anything to offer distraction, I’m sorry,” Gil brought Malcolm’s attention back.

“JT said you needed something?” Malcolm recalled.

“Need you to move me to opposite side parking.” Gil took his keys out of his pocket and handed them over.

Malcolm palmed the rabbit’s foot, petting it with his thumb. Touch Gil's car? "You’re too tired to go downstairs,” Malcolm accused.

“Yeah,” Gil admitted.

“So it’s not working for you either?”

_You are challenging the bounds of the Think-e._

Malcolm bopped his ear, trying to make the voice go away.

“There are problems,” Gil shared.

“Did you tell the doctor?”

_Think-e knows best, my boy._

“Did you?” Gil looked at him skeptically as Malcolm hit his ear again. “Let’s both do that and compare notes.”

"I'm gonna go help JT and Dani," Malcolm dismissed the idea.

"They don't need — "

"I'm _always_ needed."

* * *

JT, Dani, and Malcolm sifted for commonalities in the conference room hoping to find…something. Anything more than the blank page of possibilities they had to offer that Gil would not be pleased with were it their only progress by the end of the day.

Malcolm read off a paper, "Mae’s cotton blend was a squeeeeee-eep amount of feeeeeeeeeeeeeeee fabric — “

“What the hell, Bright?” JT cut him off.

“I design my own reality. I design my own reality,” Malcolm repeated, his eyes rocking side to side.

“Bright?” Dani held his shoulder.

“I can heeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.” Malcolm’s arms shook and Dani lowered him into a chair.

“Bright, what’s wrong?”

“I don’t eeeeeeeeeeeeee.” He grabbed at his neck.

“Let me get it, let me get it,” Dani urged, JT taking his hands.

Dani slid back the skin at his collarbone and popped out the microSD card.

_I am willing to let go and trust myself._

“Talk to me,” JT instructed.

“I didn’t know you were the handholding type,” Malcolm replied.

“Strange things have happened since I got cyborg friends,” JT returned.

_I am willing to let go and trust myself._

“Foosball this damn thing!” Malcolm yelled, drawing attention from outside the door.

Malcolm pushed JT’s hands away and stood. “I need to check on Gil.”

* * *

Judging by the repetitive banging emanating from underneath Gil’s desk, with no Gil in sight, things were not okay. “Gil,” Malcolm called as he walked in the door.

The closer Malcolm got, the more he realized Gil was moaning in pain. “He needs to go to the doctor,” Dani’s unexpected voice made Malcolm jump.

“Foosball!” Malcolm exclaimed.

“I’m pretty sure you should go too,” Dani added.

“No — no…”

* * *

“Don’t remove my SD, Mom. Please, Mom, no. Need my brain juice,” Malcolm mumbled.

Gil squeezed his thumb and index finger at the bridge of his nose. “He really needs to stop getting hurt.”

“No — no — mine!” Malcolm got more agitated. “Don’t take it out — makes me better.”

“Kid — you’re in the hospital,” Gil tried.

“Foosball!”

“Malcolm, you’re safe, dear,” Jessica soothed his hand.

“Trust myself, trust myself, trust myself.”

“What did they give him?” she remarked to Gil. “The eighties weren’t this weird.”

“JT — my brain juice — eeeeeeeee.”

Gil broke out laughing, taking Jessica’s glare in stride.

“You can deal with him however many hours it takes him to come down,” Jessica warned.

“Nooooooo,” Malcolm howled, ripping at his neck.

Gil snapped from laughing to serious, jumping in to grab his wrists to keep him from hurting himself. “Get the nurse,” Gil directed, but Jessica was already half out the door.

* * *

It didn't even take the full day for Malcolm to go from post-surgery haze to frustrated, drug-influenced argumentative. He only woke for brief bouts at a time, but when he did, Gil and Jessica had no idea what they were going to get. The nurse had told them it was completely fine to call for her again if he clawed at his bandages, but for the most part, if Malcolm got agitated while sleeping, Gil held him and rubbed his back for a few minutes until he calmed.

That did little while he was awake.

“Don’t let them give me sedatives,” Malcolm repeated the heavily mumbled instruction to Jessica. “How many times have we had — “

“You needed _surgery_ ,” Jessica reminded with a dramatic scowl.

“Kid — “ Gil attempted to step in.

“Stop threatening to chip me!” Malcolm yelled, sounding more lucid, and glared at Gil. “This is all your fault!”

“I’m pretty sure you’re the one who ran into the building and got clotheslined and stabbed by the suspect!” Gil returned equal increasing volume.

“Stop!” Jessica raised her voice, inserting herself as the authority in the room. Malcolm started to talk again, but she cut him off. “ _Both_ of you.”

Malcolm and Gil glared at each other, but Gil wilted back into a chair. “I’m glad you’re okay, kid,” Gil extended a peace offering.

Jessica went to touch Malcolm’s arm, but he shrank back. “You forced the two of us to get our brains reprogrammed,” his voice sounded both accusatory and confused.

Jessica chuckled at the assertion. “There’s too much to unpack in that.”

Malcolm scratched at his collarbone again, the itchy bandage driving him crazy.

“Stop.” Jessica grabbed his wrist. “You reopen that, and you’re gonna end up back in surgery.”

“Probably not,” Malcolm returned.

“Give your mother a break,” Gil chimed in.

“She got you too, Gil. Better watch out while you sleep.”

“Kid — “

“Maybe she picked up a few tricks along the way,” Malcolm mumbled.

“ _Malcolm,_ “ Jessica scolded.

“Kid, take a break,” Gil warned before anyone could say anything else to make things worse. Malcolm sounded closer to lucid, yet not like himself.

Malcolm took a deep breath and looked to Jessica. “I need you to _promise_ you won't use your money to turn us into cyborgs."

So much for lucid.

Jessica shifted all her weight onto one hip and rested a hand there. “Do you want that in a contract? Right next to if my son gets his damn self hurt again I'm gonna need hazard disbursement?"

"That's for a — "

"Correct me, and I'll bring Ilsa back,” she threatened.

“No cyborgs,” Malcolm demanded, persistent to get the response he wanted.

“Okay, no cyborgs,” Jessica replied.

Malcolm fell back asleep, leaving Gil and Jessica to stare at each other and wonder what the fuck happened.

“Should have recorded him to remind him later,” Jessica said teasingly, looking across the bed to Gil, her face tired.

“I don’t know if I’ll make it if I have to listen to all that again.”

“Then maybe keep him _inside_. At a _desk_ ,” she reiterated a bit sternly.

“ _Jessica_ — “

She sighed. “Can’t blame me for trying.”

“He’d find a way to get hurt there anyway.”

She agreed with silence, rubbing the back of her son’s hand one more time before retreating with Gil to the chairs in the corner.

* * *

_fin_


End file.
